Asylum seekers return to South after 'race abuse'

SEVEN Romanian gypsy families who were moved from London to Glasgow at a saving of 450 per family a week to help ease the burden of asylum seekers on London are being moved back to the Home Counties.

The 30 men, women and children who were sent to a "hard to let" housing estate are to be rehoused in High Wycombe after claiming racial harassment.

The move threatens the dispersal system designed to ease the pressure on London.

The families originally lodged asylum claims in Hammersmith and Fulham but, in line with other London boroughs, the council moved them to cheaper accommodation on Glasgow's rundown Sighthill estate.

Like most London local authorities, Hammersmith has little choice but to rely on the dispersal system if it is to cope with future asylum applications.

London councils spend around 200 million a year looking after around 65,000 destitute asylum seekers.

Although the government reimburses them, soaring capital property prices mean that the grants they receive are not high enough.

Accommodation for a family of asylum seekers in the capital can be as much 700 a week, while in Glasgow it is only 250 - roughly the sum that Hammersmith receives per family in grants.

Although the Romanies were moved to Glasgow under the voluntary local government London Asylum Consortium scheme, the situation does not bode well for the Home Office, which launches a similar project today.

From today its National Asylum Support Service takes over responsibility for the dispersal, food and accommodation of all new destitute asylum seekers who lodge applications in London.

Already delayed because of a lack of suitable housing, experts, warn of an exodus of families demanding to come back south.

Over recent weeks the Romany families, who claim to have been persecuted in their homelands of Romania and Poland, have complained of threats and racial abuse from locals in Glasgow and said they were afraid to let their children outside because of the risk from the area's drug addicts and dealers.

Now, after a three-day visit from a Hammersmith council worker to investigate their concerns, the Labour borough has reluctantly decided to move them to Buckinghamshire.

The authority has refused to comment publicly on the reasons for the move, citing client confidentiality. But sources have told the Evening Standard that despite some scepticism about the gypsies' allegations, they had little choice but to take them seriously.

"The complaints included racial abuse and physical threats, including one person being threatened with a broken bottle, which was reported to police," said one insider.

"It wasn't clear whether every allegation was true, but the council concluded that there was still an unacceptable risk, which could have left us open to legal challenge had we ignored it."

The decision is believed to have caused considerable anxiety among those in charge of London's asylum seeker dispersal programmes.

With the vast majority of applicants preferring to stay in the capital, they fear that the move could lead to a tide of similar claims from other asylum seekers who have been relocated across the UK, leaving the scheme in tatters.

Meanwhile, it is claimed that the Romanies themselves had been responsible for their own misfortune with local residents accusing gypsy people of muggings and thefts.

They claim that while there had been few problems with the other asylum seekers on the estate - mainly Kosovars and Iraqi Kurds - the antisocial activities of some Romanies had heightened racial tensions in general.

Glasgow city council has been keen to play down suggestions of racial tension in the area, although its task was not made easier when a previous group of Romany refugees was sent back to Wandsworth recently after being caught begging on the streets.

A source said the situation was creating a considerable dilemma for Hammersmith.

"It is likely that in a predominantly white area like this, asylum seekers will stand out because of the colour of their skin.

"Unfortunately the only place where that doesn't happen is in cities like London. But at the same time it's very hard for us to tell whether people are simply making it up or genuinely at risk."

GRIM ESTATE ROAMED BY GANGS OF YOUTHS

AT FIRST, in the sunshine, Glasgow's Sighthill Estate, doesn't look too bad.

The grass verges are trimmed and there are no outward signs of hostility or racism, writes Andrew Brown.

The estate, a maze of vast tower blocks set on a sprawling site on Glasgow's depressed north side, is home to around 10,000 people. The city council has installed CCTV and concierge-controlled entry systems on all flats.

Despite being one of Europe's largest housing estates, it is served by only a small semi-derelict shopping precinct which offers little beyond a Post Office, a couple of takeaways, and an off licence. The queues that form while asylum seekers exchange vouchers in the Post Office are a source of petty friction with locals, while some of several hundred asylum seekers who live there speak fearfully of the "Young Teams" - the gangs of local youths who roam the estate robbing, fighting and vandalising.

Standing at the foot of one of the estate's 10 tower blocks is a group of Iraqi Kurds, most of whom paid up to $20,000 for an illegal smuggler to get them out of Saddam's reach.

Hemin Mohamad, 23, has only stumps for arms and a scarred face. His companions say he was injured by a letter bomb. The Kurds have no problems with the accommodation. It is the surrounding area, they say, that makes their life a misery. "My children can't go out on their own because they get attacked," said Hoia Shekh, 35, one of the few who speaks a little English.

"I'd be quite happy anywhere else - Birmingham, Manchester, London, even other parts of Glasgow. Just not Sighthill."

Copyright 2000
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.